Pages

Wednesday, April 1, 2015

Those Parental Intentions I Dished on Three Years Ago

Happy April! (I can't believe THIS was one year ago. I miss that sweet man!)

Sometimes I stroll down the path of archives of this blog. Sometimes it's because I'm in search of something specific, and sometimes it's simply because I want to see where I was x amount of years ago and how much things have changed (or not) since then. I love comparisons that span a specific amount of time, as evidenced by THESE handmade coasters. Do you ever do that? I think it's really neat that THIS picture was taken exactly one year before my nephew was born. When that photo was taken, we had no idea that Kyle was on my sister's horizon. The first time I had this realization, I teared up. So much changed for our family in that year. We grew and worried and healed and fought and loved and came out on the other side one family member greater.

Oh, gosh. Here I go getting carried away with posts of Lindsay's Blog Past. I love that blogs can be little scrapbooks of our lives.

Back to the point.

In looking through my "Parenting" category of my posts, I came upon a post I wrote three years ago called Parental Intentions, and I thought it would be interesting to revisit those five things I had planned for my pregnancy/parenting days.

Have a natural birth. Check! I didn't prepare with Bradley Method or Hypnobabies, because quite honestly, I didn't feel like I needed to. My greatest preparation was talking candidly with other women who had done it (the good, the bad, and the ugly, so to speak) and mentally preparing myself. I approached childbirth with reminders to myself that the baby and I were healthy, I had successfully carried a baby for nine and a half months, and that my body was prepared for childbirth.

Use cloth diapers. We scrapped this idea back in October when we moved to Memphis. When we were in Knoxville, there was a cloth diaper service we planned on using. With both my husband and I working full-time, we were glad to know that someone else would pick-up the dirty diapers and deliver clean ones every week. When I accepted the job in Memphis, we found out that there isn't a similar service here. Furthermore, my husband would be working from home which means he would have been doing all the cloth diapering work. There was no way I was going to obligate him to that, considering it was my goal to cloth diaper all along. I appreciate that he was on board for as long as he was, but parenting is enough work. There wasn't a big discussion about it. One day I simply said, "We don't have to cloth diaper. It's not the end of the world. We have to do what works best for our family." Relief washed over his face!

Breastfeed. Breastfeeding has been wonderful so far, and I am so thankful for that. Presley hasn't had any issues nursing, and I've not had any pain or complications. I don't enjoy pumping (or robot nursing, as it should be called), but breastfeeding has been a success. I'm the resident milk maid!

Make homemade baby food. Press won't be eating solids for another four and a half months, but when she does, homemade baby food is still on the docket. And yes. We will still have a vegetarian household, but once she starts making food choices (in a couple years), she will be free to eat meat when we go out to eat or at gatherings/parties. Her choice.

Use baby sign language. We have a few baby sign language books, and we plan to start signing with Press when she is four months old. Neither of us is fluent in ASL (I wish I was!), but we'll integrate the things we anticipate she'll want to communicate before she can speak: Dad, Mom, milk, more, yes, no, diaper, cat, hurt, thank you, please, etc. I'm excited for this! I have a personal interest in ASL. Recent loves are Signed With Heart on Instagram and the Marlee Signs app.

If I've learned anything in my time of carrying, birthing, and mothering a child, it is that life requires flexibility, but 4 out of 5 ain't bad!

How do you set and reflect on your goals?How do you "scrapbook" your life, if at all?

6 comments:

It's fun to look back in your archives and reflect. We are scrapbookers :) And as for this vegetarian household business, we too are a vegetarian household. Well, mostly. Every few months my husband requests that I cook him chicken and he eats meat when dining out but for the most part we both stick to plants. This said, I've often been asked, and wondered myself, how I'll handle the issue. I'd like to think I'd say "hey your choice" but at the same time, what happens when requests for McDonald's chicken mcnuggets start popping up? I just don't know how I'd peel the look of horror from my face, haha.

Strolling through the archives is so fun. Sometimes I get lost in them, seeing how much has changed and yet how much is still the same. You've worked pretty diligently on this parenting list mama! We have very similar goals so far :-)

Okay, I'm totally and completely ignorant when it comes to anything and everything relating to babies. What's the idea behind teaching babies sign language? Is it because they can learn it before they learn to speak? I've always been curious!

The Fella and I don't have a baby on the horizon just yet (but we have stopped preventing one, so who knows...) but we too plan on having a vegetarian household. I'm not completely veg, I do eat meat when we go out to eat if I feel like it's been humanely farmed, and we're in negotiations about whether this option will be open to the future kiddos as well. I'm basically going to stalk your blog and see how it works for you ;)

Also, I have a friend who is 36 weeks, and I recently asked if she had a birth plan, and she said that she just planned on winging it when she got to the hospital. I wish I were that laid back, but I can't imagine not having a strategy going into childbirth with.

Love this list and I always love taking a walk down memory lane! I still remember sitting in pool with you & Whit when I was pregnant with Colton. Isn't it crazy how much life changes in such a short amount of time? I love keeping up with you as a new mommy! And I really wish I would have stuck to doing better with teaching Colt sign language. We tried it for a while and he never picked up on it and I got frustrated and stopped. I'm kicking myself now as he still doesn't talk. That ASL would surely come in handy right about now ;)

I loved reading this. I had a lot of similar goals and while I am cloth diapering and breastfeeding, I ended up having a c section - so my natural birth went out the window.You're so right, a huge part of being a parent is being flexible, and knowing what will work for your family!

In a Nutshell

Middle child. Working girl-mom of one. Married to my work crush that I swore I'd never date. My spirit animal is a mix of Sara Bareilles, Joanna Gaines, and a cat. A Ravenclaw married to a Gryffindor. Taking forever to finish my MBA, because #Parenting #Adulting #EducationReimbursement. I can go from feeling like a champ to a failure in parenting in three seconds flat, so basically, I'm nailing this first-time mom thing.
More HERE.